Blood, Salt and Idiocy
by RosiePeverell
Summary: "I was trying to save a foolish swordsman. Again." Rated for mentions of blood and cursing.


The Sunny pitches and rolls with the waves as Zoro climbs the rigging to bring in the sail. The wind drags at his clothing with greedy fingers, getting stronger with each passing minute, howling through the ropes of the ship like a beast. On Zoro's right Franky climbs too, pulling on the ropes in unison with the swordsman, cinching the wet, heavy cloth tightly in place. The rain has made every footing slippery and dangerous, but Zoro clings to the ship as well as he can as they work. There's a sea tornado forming far off the ship's stern. Looking at it is unavoidable – the thing takes up half the horizon as it steadily churns the ocean into a white foam and the clouds into a dark spinning mass, picking up strength with the characteristic suddenness of weather on the Grand Line.

This isn't an enemy Zoro can cut – some things you have to leave to others; others, and technology. He hears Nami call out to Franky to ready the Coup de Blast. "We'll be out of here in no time!" Franky shouts confidently, disappearing below deck. Below where Zoro stands Usopp clutches the side rail while Chopper clings to him. They're both screaming bloody murder, even though this is by no means the first – or even the biggest – storm they've encountered. Zoro shakes his head as he climbs as quickly as he can down the rigging, dropping the last few feet to the deck.

As he lands he hears Luffy give a panicked shout from the stern, where he's been whooping and hollering since the elements started to whip the water up into a funnel.

"Hey guys! There's another ship out there!"

"What?!" Nami runs past him, sandals slipping on the steps. Zoro follows her, wondering how this other ship will fare – if they're at the stern that means they're closer to the storm. He doubts this other ship, whoever it belongs to, will have the cola power of the Thousand Sunny.

Luffy's standing on top of the observation room, one arm tightly stretched double around the mast. He jumps down when Nami appears and stands with her at the railing, pointing from her cheek to show her the direction of the ship. With the rain now pelting directly in their faces it's hard to see, but finally Zoro's sight settles on it. He immediately sees that there's no hope for the poor bastards. It's a small ship – about the same size as Merry had been – and it's rolling dangerously close to the tornado, over a kilometre away.

Just as he thinks this Luffy stretches out an arm, whipping back and then forward, so close to Zoro's cheek he feels the rush of air. The disappointment on Luffy's face tells them all – "They're too far. I can't help them," he says, dark-eyed. "It's too far and the wind's too strong."

"Are we going to just leave them?" Nami says, looking between Zoro and their captain.

"We have to," Zoro says. "It would be suicide to get close enough to save them." Luffy continues to watch the impending collision, saying nothing. His expression is slack, resigned. He doesn't contradict Zoro's answer.

Franky comes up the stairs behind them, "He's right, Nee-chan. We can't waste time with that heading directly towards us."

Nami eyes both the other ship and the approaching storm. The wind and waves have been steadily pushing them away even without sails, but the tornado's quickly closing the gap. The navigator turns away from the storm, eyes wet, sniffling, and nods to Franky without saying a thing.

Franky can't afford a word of comfort, instead running back down the stairs as soon as he sees her go-ahead. Zoro almost pries a hand away from Shusui's hilt, to reach out a hand to touch her elbow, but she's already walking away from him, one hand on the railing to steady herself against the waves.

Zoro follows her down, leaving Luffy at the back of the ship to watch the other ship with trepidation and a sadness that he doesn't bother to conceal. The closer the ship gets to the storm the further his eyebrows furrow, the tighter his fists clench, the higher his shoulders hunch._ It's a sad thing to have happen when we can't do a thing, but we have the chance to escape with our lives and our ship intact._

Zoro's foot hits the bottom step with this last thought when he hears Luffy's choked cry. "The ship is being torn up!" Zoro tenses with horror for a split second as he thinks of the Sunny's timbers coming apart, but he realises that Luffy must mean the other ship. There's no way in hell waves of this size could break the Adam wood.

Zoro bounds back up the stairs with the others in time to see the other ship drawn up into the tornado like a child's toy. As it rises the flag flies off the mast. Zoro, his arm pressed against the captain's own, feels Luffy flinch as the flag, unrecognisable as being any particular crew's at this distance, flutters up and into the water. The mast and sails follow, ripping from their supports and plowing into the tornado, which swallows them easily. The rest of the ship lasts only a second before it comes apart entirely. From this far away Zoro can't be a hundred percent sure of any bodies, but he thinks he sees one person, man or woman, clinging to the railing as it flies away. Aboard the Sunny the Strawhats are deathly quiet.

They are, that is, until Nami – the only one of them quick enough to realise that, horror aside, they need to get the hell outta there – jumps back to attention.

"Alright, everyone!" she shouts. "Hold on to something!"

The crew scrambles for a handhold and Zoro braces himself for launch, hearing Franky yell something unintelligable from below. The deck rumbles and they take off, shooting up into the air and away from the tornado. Around them the sky clears a little, and he loosens his grip as the initial rush of take-off subsides.

Zoro turns his head as Chopper screams his name, and an instant later a hard body hits him, impacting his chest and stomach, knocking his breath away. He falls, shocked, to the deck, feeling the back of his head bounce on the wood. Something warms his abdomen while everywhere else cold rain still falls. He scrunches his eyes closed while he waits for the pain behind his eyes to fade. It feels like something's pinning him down, too; heavy weights on his forearms, legs draped like logs over his own.

He opens his eyes, and... "Hey, what are you-"

The cook's face is inches from his own, but Zoro sees instantly that this isn't some ill-timed come-on. His grey-blue eyes stare hazily at the swordsman, and the hands that still clutch Zoro's arms are shaking intensely.

Then he coughs blood into Zoro's face, and his eyes glaze over the way the world does when Zoro drinks too much with dinner. From somewhere in the distance Luffy's scream of "SANJI!" mixes with Brook's gasp of "Sanji-san!" and Zoro thinks he hears Chopper sobbing, but what he's really concentrating on is that too-warm feeling that's spreading across his stomach, and something else that takes a while to register as a throbbing pain. He looks down the length of the cook's body and his own, choking at what he finds. Now he sees why his nakama are all screaming and crying; there's something sticking through the cook and into him, and that warmth is hot red blood, Sanji's dripping and mingling with Zoro's. There seems to be a lot of it.

_What the fuck happened..._

"Z- Zoro-" the cook gasps, and collapses, shaking, flush on top of Zoro like a ragdoll. As he does the thing sticking out of him plunges deeper into Zoro's stomach. There's nothing to do then but pass out.

* * *

It's probably only a few minutes before he wakes again, because he's still on the deck at the top of the stairs. Sanji is gone, as is everyone else. It's no longer raining, either, and the roar of the tornado has been replaced with the tender rise and fall of a calm sea. He's staring straight up at a blue sky blanketed with thin, wispy clouds, crossing over each other like a patchwork quilt. Seagulls pass overhead, crying out harshly.

Now he hears shouting coming from inside the ship – the unmistakeable tones of Nami's in-charge voice, and second later Franky comes up the blood-slicked stairs and picks him up gently. They're halfway across the deck before Zoro tries to protest. The pain garbles his words into a choked slur, so he opts for a swift punch to the arm that holds him instead. Franky drops him to his feet more in shock than anything else. The impact of his feet on the floor almost knocks him over, but he has one hand on Franky's arm to steady himself.

"I can walk by myself," Zoro growls. Sure it hurts, but he's not going to be carried like a bride to a damn wedding bed.

He looks over his shoulder and sees the puddle of blood mingling with water at the top of the stairs, marvelling at the deep red drips that extend all the way down to the lawn deck. There're two litres of it, at least. Nowhere near as bad at what he expended on Thriller Bark, but he's bigger than that fool cook – he has more to lose.

He shuffles along the grass, one hand pressed hard to the round hole in his stomach while Franky follows worriedly behind him.

He hears the scuffle in the infirmary before he sees it.

"Is Sanji going to die?!"

"Please stay back Luffy; I can't see anything when your head's in the way!"

"But Chopper, what if he needs heaps of new blood?! Do we have enough? What if we can't get the thing out? Do you need help?"

"You can help me by letting me work! FRANKY!"

Franky passes Zoro and enters the infirmary, coming out a few moments later with a squirming Luffy in his big arms. Luffy, indignant, wriggling like a worm, yells, "How come Robin gets to stay! I'm the Captain!"

Nami pokes her head out past Franky, sees Zoro, and pulls him inside, then slips past him and closes the door behind her. Through the door Zoro hears her reprimanding Luffy for getting in the way of their doctor while he's trying to work. "I heard a story about a guy who got impaled like that, and he was paralysed for the rest of his life! I just wanna know if Sanji's alright!"

"You will, let's just wait somewhere quietly while Robin and Chopper fix him, okay? This is nothing they can't handle. We'll only get in their way." Their voices trail away and Zoro takes his first look around the room. Despite his best efforts to remain conscious his vision is blurring and blackening at intervals – maybe he's lost more blood than he initially thought.

He feels a stab of pain in his abdomen as he takes in a sharp breath at the sight of their cook, lying on his side on the table. He's unconscious, paler than usual, breathing shallowly. And there's a long piece of wood, as thick as one of the cook's own arms, piercing his abdomen. Zoro stares while Chopper works. The reindeer moves quickly around the prone body, examining the wound.

"Oi, Chopper... How bad is it, really?" Usopp says from Zoro's left. He hadn't noticed the sniper at first, quietly sitting in a chair beside the bed, almost hidden in the corner. He's apparently over his terror of earlier, but there's a wound in his forehead that's steadily pulsing blood over one closed eye. Robin's doing her best to tweeze out small slivers of timber and stitch the cut closed, but like most head wounds it's bleeding profusely. There's already a good sized wad of blood-soaked gauze sitting on the table next to them.

"He's badly hurt," Chopper says, quietly and calmly, deep in doctor mode. "The wood thankfully missed piercing any major organs but shattered part of his hipbone, and he's lost almost three pints of blood. I have to get it out quickly and repair the damage before he dies from shock or his abdominal cavity fills with fluid."

While Usopp gapes at the mention of the word 'dies', Robin finishes the stitching of his wound, then stands, saying, "Is there anything else I can do to help?"

"Can you sedate Zoro? I think he'll be fine to sleep for a few hours while I operate on Sanji, his wounds aren't nearly as bad-"

"Oi, what do you mean, 'sedate'?!" Zoro stands up, vision reeling, and can barely resist when Chopper, in Heavy Point, pushes him back down.

"If you keep moving around you'll make it worse. I can't worry about you running around and rupturing something while I save Sanji's life!"

While Zoro tries to focus on Chopper, Robin readies a syringe of anaesthetic, and sticks it unceremoniously into the skin in his side, between his shirt and pants. He looks down, confused. _Wh… where's my haramaki?_

The last thing he sees before he passes out is Robin's soft smile as she gently lays him down, and the movement of her lips as she murmurs, "See you soon…"

* * *

Zoro hears something beeping softly, bringing him to the edge of consciousness. His mind is blissfully blank aside from a few wandering thoughts of sun-warmed skin and blue sky. Beneath him the ocean moves calmly.

The beeping continues and becomes more persistent, until it begins to irritate him. _Did Luffy leave the fridge door open again? Maybe it's a bomb..._ He wakes with a start and immediately searches the room, still lying down. There's Chopper's desk, the chair – now empty – that Usopp was sitting on, a tray of medical tools, the table, the still form of the cook... The beeping's coming from a small machine set up next to the table. A thin green line spikes over and over again in the little window. _Must be his heartbeat. The bastard still looks awful, but Chopper and Robin saved his life, at least, if they're all gone..._

The two of them are the only ones left in the infirmary. The surfaces have been cleaned and all that blood he dripped over the floor in his way in has been scrubbed away. And the cook's still asleep, but sleeping soundly, not unconscious as he was before. He's curled up on his side, facing Zoro. From where Zoro lies on his back he can see tinges of colour in his cheeks, and on closer inspection finds the line that connects a bag of blood, hanging from a pole, to one slim white wrist. There're no lines in Zoro, though. He pats himself down without sitting up, searching his abdomen and finding a padded bandage stuck to his skin with tape. He fights the urge to rip it off, knowing Chopper wouldn't appreciate that.

Now that he finally has some time to think, he's itching to wake the cook and ask him what happened. Did the bastard jump in front of him in a fool attempt to save Zoro's life? Or was he forced, by the speed of the piece of the wood, into Zoro, impaling the both of them? Zoro's not sure which explanation would annoy him most.

'Cause this isn't the first time he's done something like this. Not so long ago on Thriller Bark, he'd knocked the idiot out for trying to save his life. They haven't spoken about it since but the memory pops up every now and again; the hand that clutched at his arm before his body had slumped to the ground, leaving Zoro to make the sacrifice alone. It makes him feel angry and slightly confused every time._ For whatever reason, he couldn't leave me to do what I had to do. Whose life was he trying to save? Mine? Luffy's? Or both of ours?_

"Oi... stop staring, sh-shitty marimo..." the cook says, sleepily stumbling over his words.

"I wasn't staring!" Zoro protests, realising as he says so that yeah, he'd been staring – zoned out, but staring.

Surprisingly, there's no retaliation forthcoming; the cook simply raises his stupid curly eyebrow and smirks, looking at him through heavy eyelids. It makes Zoro feel a little uncomfortable – he was expecting a barrage of insults, but no – nothing at all. He clears his throat, wincing at the twinge of pain in his side as his stomach muscles tighten, and stares at the ceiling, thinking of how to phrase his one question.

Finally he comes up with a simple, "Why?" and leaves it at that.

"I didn't think," he hears. "I just acted."

This gives rise to more questions, none of which Zoro really wants to ask. This is getting pretty awkward and he's not sure how long he can hold off eye contact before the build-up of tension becomes too much.

"You pulled that on purpose, then?"

"You mean I saved your life on purpose, you ungrateful shit? Yeah, I guess so." The cook's voice sounds much weaker than usual, but there's an unmistakeable undertone of anger there.

"I didn't ask you to do something like that."

"Like I said – I didn't think."

"Hmph."

He can feel those blue eyes on him. _Now who's staring, asshole?_

"I would've done the same thing for all of you, anyway," the cook mutters indignantly.

"You didn't do it for any of them. You did it for me_."_

He turns his head to his left and sees the cook, red in the cheeks, looking away.

"I think it was... I wanted to- to pay you back, for stopping me on Thriller Bark."

"Eh? Don't be an asshole! You didn't owe me shit for that."

"Seems to me that I tried to save your life back then, and instead you saved mine. And Luffy's, and everyone else's."

"I don't want to talk about this," Zoro grumbles. He knows the two of them would be throwing punches by now if either had the strength to move. For the moment it's enough to simply sling insults – for Zoro, anyway. He's prepared to forget all this, but the bastard keeps talking. "Zoro, listen, I know we have a lot of differences but it doesn't change the fact that we fight together, that I cook for you and you spend more time on lookout than anyone else, and that the both of us protect this ship, and all the people on it. We do all that together. We're still nakama. So it shouldn't be so hard for us to admit that we care about each other." His voice is remarkably even.

Zoro digs his fingers into the mattress and stares at the ceiling again. _Because that's not how our relationship works._

"I guess that's just not how we do things, huh. Damn, do I need a cigarette." Zoro hears a strain in Sanji's voice, like there's something sitting on his chest. "I feel like shit."

Zoro's still scowling a minute later when the monitor starts beeping out of control. He almost falls out of the bed in his haste to sit up. He ignores the blinding rush of pain, the feeling of stitches pulling loose, the sticky warmth of new blood seeping through his bandages, and walks like a crippled old man to the door. Behind him Sanji's body is shaking, rattling the metal supports of the bed.

He falls through the door just as Chopper wrenches it open. The doctor yells out in surprise, and Zoro hears Nami say, "I've got him. You go." Chopper steps right over Zoro, with Robin right behind him.

"What were you doing?" Nami scolds. She's rolling him onto his back again, and it's all he can do to help her even a fraction, because his limbs feel like they're barely there. "You should know we'd be here in an instant if something like this happened." She sounds like she's trying to stay calm but the usually fierce tones of her voice are layered with worry.

"I know... know that..." Zoro breathes. "S-stupid... wasn't thinking."

"You were worried," she says, as he frowns.

Firm fingers clasp his shoulder and lower his side until his back is flat on the cool wooden floor. The movement sends a lance of pain through his abdomen. "Aah! Hurts."

"I'm sorry!" she says. "You'll have to stay here for now. I can't move you back to the bed by myself."

"Let me see them," he says. He's breathing heavily, still, and Nami's face is pinched when he looks up at her. She stares at him, pale-faced through the locks of hair that hang in her eyes, one hand still on his shoulder, trembling. "Come on," he insists. "Help me sit up." He sees indecision and decides to help her make her choice by giving her none at all. He fights the apathy in his limbs, willing himself to prop himself up on one elbow. Within seconds his muscles start to flutter like paper, weak, fragile – but Nami's warm hands support him in time. She uses her own body to prop him up, sitting sideways with one leg beneath his knees and the other at his back, bent to give him something to lean on. The doorway and the wall behind them are too far for him to move to right now.

He can see the others now – the doctor, the archaeologist and the cook, in the middle of the room before him. Zoro feels like he's not quite there, as if they exist in the real world while Zoro watches through a window. His breath comes quick and fast, and he barely notices Nami rubbing the base of his neck as she attempts to calm him down. His chest feels tight and it's becoming difficult for his mind to focus. His fingers scrabble for Shusui's hilt, but of course it's not there.

Nami's voice echoes within him – "Y_ou're worried". You're afraid he's going to die. You're afraid it's going to happen while you sit here watching, unable to help. You're afraid. Is this how he felt when you almost died for Luffy back at Thriller Bark? You saw and felt your blood flowing from your body, saw his face when he looked back at his footprints, tracked through all the red covering the grass. You saw the colour rush from his cheeks like wine draining from a bottle, saw the way his lips moved without sound as you said, "Nothing. Nothing's wrong," and inched back to the ship without him to patch yourself up the way you've done so many times before._

Nami's hand at the base of his neck shakes him softly. "Stay awake, Zoro."

He blinks at the bright light above Sanji's bed, trying and failing to follow the activity around the cook's prone body. Chopper's hands are moving quickly, delicate and sure with the silver scalpel, Robin hovering at his side, ready with whatever he might need. Zoro watches hazily. He can't remember ever being this tired, and it's become a battle to stay awake.

"Nami," Zoro says, drooping wearily. "I'm gonna pass out." He tries to fight it, opening his eyes forcefully, doing all he can to stay awake short of physically reaching up to pull up his eyelids. "Wanna m... make sure... he's okay."

Nami almost sounds like she's smiling as she says, "He will be." She might have said more, but Zoro's not conscious to hear it.

* * *

When Zoro wakes he's on the bed by the wall once again, but this time there's barely a moment of disorientation as he pulls himself out of sleep and into a sitting position. It's dark in the infirmary. The lights are off and the one small window shows a circle of midnight blue sky sprinkled with red and gold stars, and shining with the silvery glow of the moon.

Still, Zoro can clearly see Sanji just a few feet away, the green light of the beeping monitor dancing over his pillow. He lets out a breath he hadn't realised he'd been holding. _He's alive._

Zoro feels much better physically, too. When he pats his stomach he finds a fresh bandage, but this one's a lot thinner. It had been early morning when they'd sighted the tornado. He wonders how long he'd slept. Apparently it had been long enough to get him on his way to a proper recovery.

When he stands there's barely any pain. He feels a wooziness he hadn't sitting down, and decides that he's probably on pain meds, which would explain both symptoms. Despite that pleasant painlessness he stands still for a few moments before taking another step towards the door. He listens hard, trying to pick up the sound of the cook's breathing. He's definitely alive – the monitor clearly states that, with its jumping green line and constant soft beep – but there's no inhale and exhale to accompany it.

He gets a little closer, staring at the cook's chest, and there it is, that rising and falling, shallow, but definitely there. Proof of life. Proof that the machine's not faulty. Proof enough that the tightness in his own chest lessens as he walks towards the door and opens it to walk slowly into the corridor, where the lights are on and glowing golden into the room behind him, but he doesn't look back. He's damn thirsty.

It must be quite early in the morning, because the ship is perfectly quiet and void of any moving human form besides the swordsman himself. He peeks into the boys' room when he passes, just for a second, and sees Usopp sprawled in his hammock with one hand curled loosely around the handle of his slingshot, and Luffy snoring softly on a futon on the floor. The girls' door is open too. Robin, usually up so late reading, is curled up under the sheets, mouth soft, the corners of her lips upturned. He can't see Nami for the darkness, but he doesn't look long anyway.

He pads on bare feet to the kitchen and switches on the light, wincing slightly as his eyes adjust. He opens the fridge and looks momentarily between the jug of chilled water and the three small bottles of sake. The choice isn't hard to make.

Zoro carries the sake back to his room, trying to remember any past bad experiences with mixing pain medication and alcohol. The echoes of the beeping machine reach down the corridor towards him before he catches sight of the room at all, like a flare in the night leading him back to his ship. He raises the bottle to his lips and takes a swig. Half the first bottle is gone before he even reaches the door.

He hears the rustle of covers when he steps inside and closes the door behind him. The cook's awake and raising an arm to scratch his chest. It doesn't look like he's noticed Zoro yet. The doors on this ship are so well oiled, what with Franky doing maintenance twice a week.

"Who's there?" the cook says sleepily. _Huh_.

Zoro answers by walking to his bed, into Sanji's line of sight.

"Is that water?" the cook asks. "My throat feels like the Sandora Desert."

Zoro wordlessly hands him a bottle. Sanji chokes with surprise at the first sip, but then he takes another. "Definitely not water," he murmurs. Zoro doesn't take the sake back. He's sated; let the fool cook have it.

He climbs back into bed, pleased that the sheets lost the warmth of his body heat during his absense. They feel good on his bare skin, and he lies still for a few moments as he cools down. He hadn't realised how much the short walk to the kitchen had taxed his body, and even though there's no pain, his limbs still hold on to that awful weak feeling from before. In a way it's even worse than pain.

"Zoro?"

He looks over at the cook. "Uh?"

"I'm sorry."

He can't find anything to say so he sits up instead, and opts to stare at the cook through the almost-darkness. Outside the window a cloud slides over the moon, and the shadows inside the infirmary deepen.

"I – I'm sorry I couldn't – that even though I tried I couldn't stop it from hitting you."

Still no words present themselves. It's almost as if every word in Zoro's vocabulary has fled into the night. He feels mute. He's sure that even if he did find something to say he wouldn't be able to make a sound.

"I tried to save you and you still might have died. " Sanji still hasn't taken his eyes off Zoro, and those eyes... is he crying?

The clouds drift away and sure enough, there are silver tear tracks slipping like raindrops on a window down his cheek and into his fringe, and Zoro can't do more than gape at this point.

"What if – what if you'd died? I don't think I could live with myself. If something so simple as a bit of flying timber had – had..."

"I didn't die," Zoro says. "But you almost did." To his own ears it sounds too harsh, but his words have no effect on the cook. Sanji blinks and new tears squeeze from between his lids, and Zoro doesn't know what to say so he throws the covers aside and walks a little unsteadily over to the bed, and pulls up a chair and sits.

Now Sanji can't seem to look at him, when it was all he could do a moment ago. He's closer now and everything's a little clearer. His damp cheeks and his eyelashes, stuck together with tears, his skin still pale and drawn from blood loss – though maybe that's the moonlight. Surely his blood's been replaced by now. Funny how something so important can be replaced so easily with someone else's. All you need is a bag and a needle and a pipeline to connect the two, and you can make someone good as new. Zoro glances at the bag above his head. He wonders how much of their supply Chopper used on this one incident. Sanji's blood type is, after all, exceedingly hard to come by.

He looks back down at the cook. Sanji's eyes are still closed and his lips are pressed together. Zoro thinks that if he weren't so badly injured Sanji would have fled by now, so embarrassed by what he'd just said. Zoro is surprised at himself – he doesn't feel like leaving right now, despite the situation. What he wants to do is make sure the cook knows not to feel guilty – that if anything he should feel annoyed at Zoro's helplessness, in those moments when Sunny had hurtled through the air like a cork from a bottle of wine; when, despite all that, Zoro should have been aware.

"Listen to me," he says roughly. "I don't blame you."

Whatever anger he'd had before disappeared when that overwhelming fear for Sanji's life first flooded over him. It doesn't really matter now how it happened. Just why.

"I would be an idiot to curse a man for saving my life when I really needed it. I'm not so stupid as to think I can get by without help. Especially from – from my nakama."

Now Sanji opens grey-blue eyes and looks at Zoro. His lips part slightly and Zoro leans backwards into the chair. He hopes that the room is dark enough to hide the blush that rises in his cheeks. He can feel it red and hot, like the flush he feels when he bends down to look in the oven. Sanji's eyes are still wet, and Zoro feels almost perverse when he looks at them, as if he isn't supposed to.

Still, he puts out a hand and rests it on Sanji's forearm, squeezing a little, hoping it's enough. Clouds continue to slide across the three-quarter moon, and beneath them the sea laps calmly, lulling them to sleep.

* * *

When Zoro wakes he feels strange, as if his spine has squashed in on itself. His face is warm, and his right hand tingles, too. He sits up and looks at it, sees white lines imprinted on his wrists – the folds in the sheets, patterned in his skin. When he looks over he finds Robin reading peacefully at the foot of the bed. She smiles when she sees him awake.

He says, "Did I fall asleep sitting up?" Maybe he's a little confused. It takes a while, sometimes, for the mornings to sink in. Zoro isn't a morning person.

So it's a shock to see the blond in the bed before him and the hand that clenches his own in a death grip. His own hand's gone numb – that's why he can't feel it.

Zoro looks over at Robin again, almost for help.

She smiles again, and closes the book softly, bookmarking the pages at the very back, only a sliver between her placeholder and the back cover. It's another archaeology tome – how she gets through them so fast still befuddles him.

"Yes," she says. "You fell asleep in the chair. It can't have been comfortable."

Zoro stares at his hand. When did he do this? _Did_ he do this, or did Sanji? He shifts in his seat and his foot nudges over a bottle of sake, and Zoro starts, but nothing comes out. The empty glass rolls over the floorboards and comes to rest under the bed by the wall. His own bed. Which he didn't sleep in.

"I think it's sweet," Robin says kindly.

Zoro feels like a little fish caught in a nest of sea kings. He can't move his arm, nor can he move his mind. There's too much to process.

"After all, he did the same after Thriller Bark," she says, quieter still, almost as if she's imparting some great secret.

That's his cue. "He what?!"

"After you went to sleep we came in to check on you. Chopper did an examination, and afterwards the cook opted to stay. When I called in the next morning he was still there, asleep, as you were just now."

Zoro's head whips around, back to their hands.

She laughs. "With one small difference."

"I have no idea how - "

He doesn't get to finish that sentence, because the cook wakes up. Robin takes that as her cue to leave, closing the door behind her. Zoro can almost feels the waves of amusement coming off her, and curses her for it. _She'd better not tell anyone._

"Zoro?"

"Ahh..." That nest of sea kings, again. Growing bigger by the second. And growling.

Sanji squeezes his hand. His fingers feel faintly warm and there's a slight dampness to his palm. Perhaps it's that that brings it to the cook's attention because he releases Zoro and slips away, and suddenly Zoro's hand feels rather cold.

For a moment the only sound inside the infirmary is the slapping of the ocean against the ship.

Sanji coughs.

_I have to get out of here._

"You know," Sanji says, voice soft with sleep. "I don't think I've ever been so scared in all my life. It's really something, being pierced through the body like that."

"Yeah, it looked bad."

"It felt worse," he says, and coughs again. Zoro finds that feeling has started to enter his hand and arm, but he doesn't move.

"You feel much better now though, don't you?" Zoro falters and avoids Sanji's eyes, rubs his slowly un-numbing arm, attempting to get all the feeling back.

"Yeah... I'll be okay."

"Robin said – when you were still asleep, that you stayed with me after Thriller Bark?"

"Yeah, I did."

"Why?"

Sanji's tongue flicks out over his bottom lip and he bites it, hesitates. Zoro looks away from his mouth again, back at his numb arm. It's almost back to normal now. He concentrates on that, until Sanji says, "I was worried."

Zoro frowns. Sanji says, "I mean - "

But Zoro interrupts, says, "I know the feeling," and Sanji starts as if receiving a little shock.

"Well, didn't you tell me to stop dancing around the fact that we care about each other? I think it's pretty obvious now, anyway."

"I really need a cigarette," the cook says, and Zoro grins.

"So, what's for breakfast?"

"Idiot, I can't even stand!"

"Weakling."

"I'm strong enough to hit you from here, you damn bastard!"

"Bet you couldn't, dartboard-head."

He reaches out and grabs the front of Zoro's shirt. Zoro's still grinning as he draws him in, other hand clenched into a shaky fist. "Oh, you wanna bet, cause I'll - "

Zoro catches his wrist in midair, so easily it's embarrassing. "You don't want to hurt the tools of your trade, now, do you?" he taunts.

"I might favour my feet in battle, but I know how to punch without hurting myself," Sanji scoffs. Zoro looks down at him and smirks, but he falters when he sees the cook's eyes. There's not a trace of anger there – they're shining, sparkling blue in the early morning light, above pink flushed cheeks and an open mouth, and Zoro acts on impulse, thinks _what the hell,_ holds Sanji's wrist tighter and edges closer. Sanji's eyes widen but he doesn't move, otherwise, and Zoro inches in until he can feel his warm breath on his lips. The cook's hand curls in Zoro's shirt, twisting the fabric into a ball in his fist, and he closes the gap. His mouth is softer than Zoro had thought it would be, and he feels the smile that curves Sanji's lip as he leans into the kiss, moving slowly, warm and trembling. Without thinking Zoro parts his lips a little and Sanji's hold on him tightens even more, pulling the collar of his shirt so that it presses against Zoro's throat, and Sanji's tongue slips into his mouth without hesitation, licking in and darting out and in again to curl around Zoro's tongue, and he's pulling Zoro even harder, so the swordsman is forced to half-stand. There's no thought in his mind except the pleasant warmth and wetness of Sanji's mouth and the way his hand has regained enough feeling to move of its own accord, now, releasing Sanji's wrist to move down to his shoulder, caressing the hard, sharp bones beneath his skin and feeling the tension there, the tremble of his muscles as he stuggles to keep himself raised up.

He's helped, of course, by the tight hold he has on Zoro's shirt, but Zoro gives him a hand anyway. As he slides his hand up to Sanji's neck he straightens his knees a little more, and Sanji settles back onto the pillow with a sigh of relief that makes Zoro laugh, and he breaks the kiss to breathe. But he doesn't move away too far. He glances down at Sanji's mouth again, marvelling at how red his lips are.

"I wasn't expecting a thank you quite like that when I woke up this morning."

"Neither was I."

"I don't mind."

Zoro smirks. "I can live with it."

He can, too. It feels like a natural step to take, from attacking each other physically to attacking each other... this way. Is this what that was all about? Did it really take the both of them nearly dying from blood loss to realise it?

"What are we going to tell the others?" Zoro frowns, suddenly remembering that there are seven other people on the ship.

"That I was trying to save a foolish swordsman," Sanji smiles. "Again."

"And?"

"The rest is up to you, I guess. I'm not too bothered either way."

"Either way, it can wait," Zoro says, and leans back in.


End file.
